GNOME provides us easy way to add some different keyboard layouts and quickly change between then easily. This allows us to quickly switch English standard keyboard into Japanese or Chinese or Arabic or any other keyboard language set by a simple click on the top panel. Use this on your GNOME when you need to type some letters or any writing in Katakana, Pinyin, or another alphabet systems.

Add Keyboard Layouts

To change quickly, we need to set them up first. You should decide what keyboard language set to add (e.g. Japanese, Chinese, etc). For example, we will add a type of Arabic keyboard here:

(1) Go to GNOME System Settings.

(2) Open Region & Language.

(3) See Input Sources section.

(4) Press Add (+) button then click triple dots button.

(5) Type Arabic then the dialog window will show you Others entry. Click it.

By the same example, you may add another keyboard layouts or another variants. See this picture.

Switch Between Layouts

You may switch between keyboard layouts quickly by top panel icon. See your top panel if there is a country identifier (e.g. en, ara, jp, etc.) then it is the layout switcher. Click it and select one layout to switch.

Switch More Quickly

You may press Super+Space to switch to another keyboard layout available. This is the same way as clicking the switcher on the top panel, but it is way quicker.